Ribetti shook his head a few times. 'I have no idea what happened. Some people came up to us—I don't know where they came from or whether they were with us or were workers— they started to shout, and then the workers did, too. Then someone pushed me and I dropped the placard I was carrying, and after I picked it up, it looked like everyone had suddenly gone crazy. People were shoving and pushing one another, then I heard the police sirens, and then I was on the ground again. Two men pulled me up and put me in the back of a van, and they brought us here. It wasn't until almost midnight that a woman in uniform came into the cell and said I could call someone.' He hurried through this summary, his voice sounding as confused as the events he described.
He turned back and forth between Brunetti and Vianello, then said to the latter, ‘I called Assunta and told her where I was, what had happened, and then I thought of you. And I asked her to see if she could find you and tell you what had happened.' His voice changed as he asked, 'She didn't call you then, did she?' he asked, forgetting that Vianello had already told him.
Vianello smiled. 'No, not until this morning.'
Brunetti noticed that Ribetti seemed relieved to hear this.
'But you didn't have to come all the way out here for me’ Ribetti said, using the plural. 'Really, Lorenzo: I don't know what I was thinking of when I asked her to call you. I guess I panicked. I thought you could make a phone call to someone here or something, and everything would be all right.' He raised a hand in Vianello's direction and said, 'Really, it never occurred to me that you'd have to come out here.' Then, to Brunetti, 'Or that you'd have to come, Commissario.' He looked at his hands again. 'I didn't know what to do.'
'Have you ever been arrested before, Signor Ribetti?' Brunetti asked.
Ribetti looked at him with an astonishment he could not disguise: Brunetti might as well have slapped him. 'Of course not,' he said.
Vianello interrupted to ask, 'Do you know if any of the others have ever been arrested?'
'No, never,' Ribetti said, voice rising with the force of his insistence. 'I told you: we're trained not to cause trouble.'
'Isn't a protest like yours a form of trouble?' Brunetti asked.
Ribetti paused, as if he were playing the question back in his mind to check for sarcasm. Apparently finding none, he said, 'Of course it is. But it's non-violent, and all we're trying to do is make the workers understand how dangerous what they do is. Not only for us, but for themselves even more.'
Brunetti noticed that Vianello accepted this, so he asked, 'What dangers, Signor Ribetti?'
Ribetti looked at Brunetti as though he had just asked the sum of two plus two, but he wiped the expression away and said, 'The solvents and chemicals they work with, more than anything else. At least at the paint factory. They spill them and splash them on themselves and breathe them in all day. And that's not even to mention all the waste they have to get rid of. Somewhere.'
Brunetti, who had been hearing this kind of thing from Vianello for some time, avoided the Inspector's glance. He asked, 'And do you think your protests will change things, Signor Ribetti?'
Ribetti threw his open hands in the air. 'God knows. But at least it's something, some little protest. And maybe other people will see that it's possible to protest. If we don't,' he said, his voice mournful and filled with conviction, 'they'll kill us all'
Precisely because he had had this kind of conversation with Vianello many times, Brunetti did not have to ask Ribetti who 'they' were. Brunetti realized how much he too had come to believe, how much he had been converted, in recent years, and not only because of Vianello's ecological conscience. He increasingly noticed articles about global warming, about the ecomafia and their unbridled dumping of toxic waste all over the South; he had even come to believe that there was a connection between the murder of a RAI television journalist in Somalia some years before and the dumping of toxic waste in that poor afflicted country. What surprised him was that there were people who could still believe that protesting against such things, in their small way, would make some difference. And, he confessed to himself, he did not like to admit that it surprised him.
'But to more practical matters,' Brunetti said abruptly. 'If you've never had any trouble with the police before, then it might be possible for us to do something.' He looked at Vianello. If you stay here, I'll go and talk to Zedda and have a look at the report. If no one's been hurt and if no charges have been brought, then I see no reason why Signor Ribetti has to remain in custody.'
Ribetti cast him a glance of mingled fear and relief. 'Thank you, Commissario,' he said, and then quickly added, 'Even if you can't do anything or if nothing happens, still, thank you.'
Brunetti stood up. He went to the door and was glad to find it unlocked. Out in the corridor, he asked for Zedda, whom he found in his office, an office only a quarter the size of his own, with one window that looked out over a parking lot.
Even before Brunetti could ask, Zedda said, 'Take him home, Brunetti. Nothing's going to come of this. No one got hurt, no one has made a
A younger Brunetti might have thought it necessary to make clear that Ribetti was Vianello's friend and not his, but after so many years working with the Inspector, Brunetti could no longer make this distinction, so he thanked Zedda and asked if there were any forms to be signed. Zedda waved him away, saying that it had been good to see Brunetti again, and came around his desk to shake hands.
Brunetti returned to the interrogation room, told Ribetti that he was free to go and could come with them if he chose, then led the others out to the waiting police car.
3
The three of them emerged from the main entrance of the Mestre Questura and started down the steps. Vianello put an arm around Ribetti's shoulder and said, 'Come on, Marco, the least we can do is give you a ride back to Piazzale Roma.' Ribetti smiled and thanked him. He wiped a hand over his eyes and drew it down one side of his face, and Brunetti could almost feel it graze across his unshaven cheek. As they continued down the steps towards the waiting car, a taxi pulled up and a short, squat man with white hair got out. He leaned in to hand money to the driver and turned to look up at the building. And saw them.
He gave a savage shove to the door of the taxi, slamming it shut behind him. 'You stupid bastard!' he shouted, starting across the pavement. The taxi drove off. The old man stopped, one hand raised, waving it at them. 'You stupid bastard’ he shouted again and started up the steps towards them. Brunetti and the others stopped halfway down, frozen with astonishment.
The man's face was distorted with anger and livid with years of drink. So short he would not reach Brunetti's shoulder, he was almost twice as broad, with a thick torso that was moving downward as muscle turned to paunch. 'You and your animals and your trees and your nature, nature, nature. Go out there and cause trouble and get arrested and get your name in the paper. Stupid bastard. You never had any sense. Now those bastards at the
Brunetti placed himself between the old man and Ribetti. 'I'm afraid there's been some misunderstanding, Signore. Signor Ribetti has not been arrested. Quite the contrary: he's here to help the police with their inquiries.' Brunetti had no idea why he lied. There would be no investigation, so there was no way Ribetti could help with it, but the old man needed to be stopped, and usually people of his age were most easily stopped by mention of the forces of order.
'And who the hell do you think you are?' the old man demanded, tilting his head back to stare up at Brunetti. Without waiting for an answer, he tried to step around Brunetti, who moved to the left and then to the right to stand in his way.
The old man stood still and raised a finger to the height of his own shoulder and poked Brunetti in the chest, saying, 'Look, you bastard, get out of my way. I don't want any interference from strangers.' He took a half-step to the left, but Brunetti blocked him again. 'I said get out of my way!' the old man shouted, this time putting his hand on Brunetti's arm. It could not be said that the old man grabbed Brunetti's arm, nor that he pulled at it, but it was certainly not the casual contact of a man trying to get his friend's attention to make a point.
Vianello came down two steps and stood to the old man's left. 'I think you'd better take your hand off the Commissario, Signore.'
The old man, however, had been carried beyond hearing by his fury. He tore his hand from Brunetti's arm and
